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Asparagus - Picking, Cooking, Canning, Freezing, Recipes and Growing

Asparagus  - Picking, Cooking and Growing

 Asparagus is one of the first crops to harvest in the early Spring. Asparagus is usually green, but there is a white (blanched) version that has been kept covered until harvested, so no light reaches it, and even a purple version.

Pick your own asparagus

Pick your own asparagus is pretty rare in the U.S., much more common in the U.K. and Europe. U-Pick white asparagus is REALLY hard to find in the U.S. Eckerts in Belleville, Illinois, has it.
To pick asparagus, just look for asparagus spears are about 6 to 10 inches above the soil line, are firm, with tightly closed tips.
Then just cut at the base (ground level) or snap each spear; they usually snap off cleanly at the ground level.

Canning, Freezing and Asparagus recipes

• Freezing asparagus
• Canning Asparagus
• Canning pickled asparagus
• Canning one jar of pickled asparagus
• Oven-roasted Asparagus recipe
• Cheesy garlic roasted asparagus
• White asparagus

Grow your own asparagus (white or green)

The Old farmer's Almanac has a good page about how to grow your own asparagus, white or green.  I've been growing it for years.  It's probably the easiest thing you can grow.  And after you harvest in the spring, you let it grow, and it produces 5 ft tall fern-like leaves that make a nice background hedge at the back of the garden. So don't plant it where it will block the sun from other parts of the garden.  The leaves suck up energy from the sun and store it in the roots to produce next Spring;'s crop.

Where to get purple or white asparagus

Upscale grocery stores, like Harris Teeter usually carry it in the Spring.